Silence

How often do you spend time in silence? That’s right, sitting with a cup of tea, going for a walk, riding your bike, in silence. No music, no podcast, no headphones, just you and your thoughts.

Does that sound scary to you? Don’t worry, that’s perfectly normal for a lot of people. In this day and age, we are so used to having background noise, sometimes audible, oftentimes visual too. Whether it’s the TV, the radio, or even scrolling social media, there’s almost always something distracting us from our thoughts.

However, sitting in silence is one of the best ways for us to tap into our intuition, tap into our inner knowing and tap into our emotions.

So, if it still sounds scary, how do we get started? Start small. We don’t climb a hill by jumping to the top, we take it step by step, right? And guess what?! You can do the same here too.

That’s right! Start off with 5 minutes per day. Maybe you make yourself a cup of tea and go sit in the garden, maybe you take yourself for a walk in the park, or go and dust off the bike to take it for a ride in your local neighbourhood. Whatever it is you enjoy doing, go and do it and spend the first 5 minutes doing it in silence & notice what comes up for you.

Do you notice thoughts filling your head feeling busy? Do you notice emotions which have been suppressed starting to rise to the surface? Maybe you actually feel a sense of peace having a break from everything around you.

And before you know it, those 5 minutes will be up, and you can choose to listen to your music again. Or, you may think ‘this is easier than I expected’ and find yourself dragging it out to 10 minutes. However long you sit in silence, make a note of it, and be proud of yourself.

Then, tomorrow, do it all over again, but see if you can extend it by 5 minutes. And again the next day, and so on, all the while being aware of what comes up for you. You may notice on the first few days, the mind is super busy and a little uncomfortable to sit with. As you get used to it, you might notice that you’re able to start making some sense of your thoughts, and notice some truths starting to surface.

Following this structure, in less than 2 weeks’ time, you could find yourself being able to spend an hour a day in silence! What do you reckon? Is it doable for you? And what activity will you try it with?